Enarmored Arts
by BrokePerception
Summary: [AU] Lexa Woods is in a relationship with Costia, who likes to take pictures of her lover and flowery scenery. It is the curls that do it, Clarke figures.
1. Chapter 1

INSPIRED BY: _iswearfealtytolexa_ (Tumblr)

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Chapter 1

A small smile came upon Clarke Griffin's face as she felt the spring wind blow across her face, picking up a few loose strands of blonde hair that had somehow managed to escape her twisted bun. She enjoyed the way she could feel the first tendrils of spring hang in the air, the way it slowly began to warm the city of Washington D.C. to prepare for summer time. Today was one of those where it was warm enough to sit in a light blazer but too cold to take it off, one of those where she liked to sit on a bench in the park between her campus, her studio and the mall, where she really liked to stroll about sometimes to clear her head if she needed to take a step back from all of the essays, when Raven or Octavia had classes at university themselves or were otherwise occupied.

Inhaling deeply, she let the soft smell of blossoming flowers and herbs fill her nostrils. It was a wonderful scent, and she felt lucky that she was not one of the unfortunate who were allergic to pollen or other things this time of year, as she had learned a lot of people were. The percentages she had seen in class had surprised her a bit. She never would have imagined those to be that high. Blue eyes fluttered open, and twenty-two-year-old Clarke's gaze travelled across the lawn, the stream, the benches, the very flowery scenery. She was not the only one who had come to enjoy the rays of sunlight there.

She saw first-year students' attempts to study from the books laid open before them, most getting too distracted by their friends to achieve such. They would go back to their dorms as the evening fell without having done anything at all. Clarke's smile got bigger as she remembered her own first year ── or, first years ── at university. She had been sort of shy at first, had been an one of those 'ideal students' in the first months, but then Raven and Octavia and she had started to do more things together, as she had gotten to know them better… With Raven in particular, in the house, Clarke Griffin had really had to learn how to study with distractions.

Then her gaze fell upon a slightly older girl a small distance away from her, sat on one of her knees and holding a professional-looking single-lens camera. The blonde noted that the girl who held the camera seemed casually dressed only, in dark jeans and a navy university sweater, but she had to say that her 'subject', by lack of another word, looked like a whole other type of woman to her, as she let her blue eyes slide over long and unruly dark curls that really characterized the girl before the camera. A soft yellow flower carefully tucked in-between them, Clarke noted, created rather nice, seemingly unintended, contrasts.

Clarke couldn't help the shiver that suddenly ran down her spine as her eyes fell on the girl's bare arms ── for her, it was still too cold to be without her blazer or jacket. The girl's bright yellow skirts were nearly the exact same color as the sunflowers her companion had picked as the perfect spot to stop and take a few pictures. Whereas the girl's style seemed a tad teenager-like, Clarke could tell by the way she behaved that she was just a bit older: she guessed early twenties, maybe a year or two her senior.

She could not put her finger on what it was, exactly, in the dynamic between the two that interested the blonde, but Clarke's interests were strangely sparked. The two girls seemed incredibly different, yet not. The way the photographer ── since Clarke didn't know their names, obviously ── turned this way and that to try and get the best shots seemed similar to how the photographed ── again, by lack of their name ── moved, somehow. Clarke Griffin was intrigued. Maybe they had been close friends forever and had adopted each other's mannerisms a bit? Briefly, she wondered if the girls might be more than friends and that that could explain it. However, in Clarke's rather limited experience, gay women didn't really wear attires like the curly-haired woman did. The photographer's choice of dress did fit with Clarke's image of lesbian women a bit better. She squinted her eyes, focused on the girly-girl's smile, checked if she saw more than friendliness, but she couldn't tell.

With a sigh, she decided that it didn't matter whether they were more than friends or not. She didn't know if it was the mystery she couldn't quite solve or not that made her fixate so much on them and feel compelled somehow, to freeze the scene before her. She blinked, and the twenty-two-year-old looked down at the sketchbook that lay in her lap, her pencil frozen on top of it. She took a hold of both items as she redirected her eyes to the two women by the sunflowers. Blindly, she turned the page so that she had an empty one under her hands again. She doubted whether she would finish the sketch that she had started earlier, of the tree by the flowing stream, but that mattered very little. She had more than one of such half-finished pieces in her sketchbook then, but it was the drawing, the creating, itself she liked most, not only getting to finish it. Of course, it brought her happiness when she could finish sketches, and fulfillment, but it wasn't of the most importance. It was all about finding things she thought were worthy of being put down on paper by her hand and as such getting captured, in time and in space, forever. The sight before her was one of those things she felt truly worthy, despite the fact she didn't know why it spoke to her, exactly.

Clarke's eyes trailed between the couple she attempted to draw as well as the paper on which she attempted to do so, noting angles, lines, shapes, before reproducing them on the page that was not empty anymore. The blonde's hand continued to float across the white sheet, creating lines ── bolder lines, softer lines ── as her gaze flashed back to the scene she attempted to freeze on paper at least every few seconds she could. Her main sketch was finished fast, as often was the case with Clarke's drawings, but it was the shading, the perfecting, the details that specifically characterized that scene and made it unique in every way, unlike other, however similar, things in the world, that took most of Clarke's time. Clarke's sketch might have started to take its shape relatively quickly, and one might have already started to see some sort of semblance to the result in it, but that's where it only started for the blonde, really.

The next time she looked up, to try to get the right shape of the soft yellow flower in the girly-girl's hair, she noted that she had risen to her feet, ready to take leave with the photographer-girl. Clarke couldn't help notice the way the 'girlier', taller girl leaned in slightly more than she thought friends would do as her companion showed her the display of her camera, undoubtedly to show her some if not all of the shots she had just taken. She saw how the two offered each other smiles, how they reached for each other's hands naturally, as if they hadn't known different in their entire lives. Maybe they hadn't either, Clarke considered. Well, they were definitely more than friends, she decided, as she saw both girls hold onto each other's hands tightly, while beginning to make way to the more flowery part of the park and, also, one of several exits. Clarke Griffin was very happy with her life the way it was, but when she saw such happy couples, sometimes, the blonde wondered if she would experience things like that, too.

Momentarily, Clarke felt the strange need to get to her feet as well and follow them, to see if the smaller girl would take more of those pictures, to get the detail she really needed to finish what she had just started. She tried to bear in mind that she was not a stalker and that she would not go for that option. She felt her heart sink a bit when she looked down at her unfinished sketch, though. This was one of those very few drawings she had ever started that really got to her, that she really wanted to complete, as if her soul couldn't rest if she didn't. Those feelings weren't unknown to her, but still, they were rare, and she couldn't say that she had ever experienced them when she had decided to draw a lesbian couple in the park.

Maybe they would be there when she was again, sometime. Clarke Griffin had hope.

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Author's Note: Please review. I'm on Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr as well, by the way ── feel free to hop on and have a look and follow me; I'm BrokePerception on all three!


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

"No, that's more your sort of guy," Octavia said when she diverted her attention off of the young man Raven had pointed at and back to her friends. She shook her head to emphasize that she couldn't believe the darker-haired brunette appeared to have seriously considered she would be interested in him as she put the bottle of beer to her lips and took a long gulp of the alcoholic liquid.

She felt that he didn't quite 'fit in', despite the fact that he had his own bottle of beer in hand and was in a conversation with some other guys, who appeared to be friends. As he spoke, his words were accompanied with big gestures of his hands, as he seemed to be telling them a joke or a story. She didn't like the look of innocence about him. Quite unnoticeably, her eyes flitted to a much rougher-looking guy in the other corner of the bar they had made their own even before they were of legal age to have alcoholic beverages. She had seen him there only a few times before, each time accompanied by a tall, lanky girl ── with dirty blonde hair, high cheekbones and an otherwise really angular face ── and a few guys that looked similar to him in style. For one reason or another, he had been the most noticeable of all of them for Octavia since the day she first saw him, although she couldn't rightly say why. She thought maybe it were his deep eyes, but she couldn't even remember them ever having rested on her. They had never even shared one word.

Raven's brow furrowed. She put her beer down with a soft thump on the bar. "Maybe you're too superficial, O. You've got to admit that he has a really nice face, and his slightly crooked smile is simply adorable. Don't you agree, Clarke?" the Engineer-to-be said as she turned her attention to her other side, where Clarke was seated, apparently staring off into space without really registering anything or anyone, including Raven's words to her. Sighing dramatically, Raven waved a hand before her blue eyes to catch her attention. "Earth to Clarke!" she called, to which the blonde seemed to snap from whichever thoughts she was still trapped in.

When she lifted her gaze up to her friends, Clarke Griffin was met with two confused and quite worried expressions. She reckoned she had been lost in her thoughts a little longer than she had guessed. "Sorry," she said, "I was lost in thought for a bit there," she clarified, before either Raven or Octavia could ask her more and push until they got more of an answer from her.

"Clearly," Raven stated, satisfied with just that before she looked back over her shoulder and nudged her chin at the guy a few feet further. The boy's hair was dark as the night and quite a bit longer than the usual, male haircuts in fashion; his jeans jacket appeared to be relatively old as well, but the Engineer couldn't decide whether that fact just made it so that it was fashionable again or not at all. Looking back at Clarke and then back at the boy to make sure the blonde was looking at the right one, she didn't need to say anything.

Clarke didn't miss the way Octavia's forehead continued to crease, in what she thought might be disbelief at her three-word explanation before she threw a glance at the young boy Raven had indicated. They had done and still did this often. She let her blue eyes slide down and back up his figure. "He's... cute, I guess" Clarke stated.

"I believe he looks too much like a choir boy," Octavia commented, putting her beer back to her mouth, pulling both Raven and Clarke's attention to her as she said this. Both girls only rolled their eyes. Octavia Blake very rarely thought of any guy as 'cool enough'. When her eyes flitted back towards him to glance at him once more and comment on what exactly was too 'choir boy' about him, Octavia gulped, and her beer went down her windpipe, which caused her to cough, making Clarke and Raven redirect their attention to what had caused that reaction from her. Simultaneously, both of their faces filled with non-objectionable surprise, as the 'choir boy' laid his jeans jacket over the empty stool beside where he stood and uncovered a half-sleeve in black ink upon his lower arm. They were too far to be able to tell what it was, but the large swirly patterns did imply maybe he wasn't as boring as they had all thought. The guy's friends seemed to pay no attention to it, though, so they quietly assumed that it was not new.

In one fluid motion, Raven Reyes turned towards Clarke again, pinning her with a glare that would have made anyone else run as fast as they could. The blonde purposefully looked away when she realized the reason for Raven's glare; she knew exactly why the tall brunette was looking at her that way. "You said you would have a good tattoo design finished weeks ago," Raven stated. "I still haven't seen it. I'd still like it before I'm old and grey and wrinkly."

"I know, I know," Clarke said as she held up her hands, in defense, no excuses available. "I just haven't felt very inspired of late. I promise I will try to get it to you by next week."

The Engineer's mouth opened to respond, but before Raven had any chance to raise her questions and tell her she had heard that one before, Octavia interrupted in a slightly louder tone to make sure she would overshadow Raven's volume if she did decide to speak, "Since when exactly does Clarke Griffin not feel inspired? You've sketched or doodled on things all the time since before I met you."

Clarke folded her hands in her lap again and shook her head. "Well, it is stupid," she tried to dismiss with a few words as she lifted her weary gaze, not wanting to tell them the reason why and have Raven and Octavia believe that she was being entirely ridiculous. If she was honest with herself, she felt that she was being ridiculous, too, but ridiculous or not, she had not been able to really draw since that day in the park, since seeing the two girls who had been so in love.

While Octavia was the most perceptive of both of her best friends, Raven was the most pushy. "Spill," she demanded.

Sighing, Clarke knew very well that Raven wouldn't let her off the hook easily. "I saw this couple a few weeks ago, two girls, and I doubted if they were just friends or a couple at first, but it became clear in the way they behaved and all and then by them holding hands that they weren't just friends. There was such a... I don't know, they had a true air about them I can't really put in words," Clarke began. "I couldn't finish my sketch before they left. I had never seen them at the park before, and I returned several times after, but didn't see them. I was hoping that I would be able to see them there again and maybe finish this sketch that I started, but..."

"Were they hot together then?" Raven asked while she wiggled her brow, and the brunette's face lit up as she said it. The grin on her face already implied that she was hinting at Clarke's interest in both men and women.

Clarke glared back for a long moment, finally choosing not to get into it, but dismissing curtly and effectively. "It wasn't like that at all, Raven. I just... There was a special air about those two, between them, like this deep connection between them that you could just see, and I wanted to create it on paper."

"And you have never seen them before?" Raven asked as she bit her lower lip thoughtfully, genuinely attempting to try to help the blonde when seeing her obvious concern.

Clarke shook her head once more, opening her mouth to confirm both non-verbally and verbally when the other brunette caught their attention, pulling both of her friends' gazes to her as she had her eyes locked upon the guy she had been caught gazing at basically every time they had been there together, "I know he and I would have a deep connection as well..."

Sighing, Raven pulled the Octavia's half-full beer from her hand and lifted it high in the air, from her reach. "You've had enough," Raven said before Octavia could say anything at all that fit her appalled expression.

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Author's Note: Please review. I'm on Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr as well, by the way ── feel free to hop on and have a look and follow me; I'm BrokePerception on all three!


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

As she lifted her spoon full of FroYo to her mouth, Clarke moaned inside her mouth when the strawberry-flavor dairy hit her tongue. It provided slight relief from the unexpected heat wave that had struck Washington DC that week as she leaned back with her eyes closed, letting the warm rays of sun hit her face and warm it. It was probably the first time since she had left with only a half-finished sketch that she was sitting in the park without looking continuously about her at the other people, looking for the women she had desperately wanted to capture on paper. It didn't mean that she had forgotten all about it, and definitely not that she had managed to pick up on her art again ── despite Raven's badgering regarding the tattoo design she had promised her some months before ── but she was, or so she thought, slowly beginning to let it go for what it was.

She thought maybe the reason why she had been so enthralled with the couple she had seen there was because she had wanted what they had, too. That realization had come a week prior, when she saw Octavia and Lincoln sit together in a back corner of the local bar, instead of Lincoln on his own, like before. It had been two weeks ago that Octavia had, after a few beers, slid down her stool and decided to walk up to the guy she had had an interest in for weeks, since she had first seen him. Clarke and Raven had looked at each other, the question evident in their eyes whether or not to pull her back before she could do anything stupid. They had let her go.

First of all, it was incredibly hard to pull Octavia Blake back from the edge when she was so set on her next move, especially when she was high on the buzz of alcohol. Secondly, they had both been a bit tired of her pining for the guy in silence... and thought that if she was that desperate for him, no matter how unapproachable he and his friends seemed like, maybe she should take a chance then and get very lucky or rejected and just learn the hard way, find closure and move on from there.

Neither of them had had any idea what to expect exactly, but they certainly hadn't expected for Octavia to walk up to them with her alcohol-induced badass attitude only to be laughing together while in deep conversation less than half an hour later. Two hours later, she had been on his lap, as she had booze on his tab and stole the occasional kiss from his lips. She hadn't returned to their side all night, and she had gone back to his place later. The next time they had spoken, Octavia had insisted that they hadn't been intimate, that all they had done was talk at his place. Neither of them knew whether they should believe her or not, but it was obvious that the guy ── although he didn't seem like it in any way and they had had their prejudices and questions about Lincoln at first ── was not a player who took advantage of women but actually very genuine. He didn't seem very interested in just sex, and it was really beginning to seem like Octavia uncovered the 'real deal' in the most unlikely of men.

It was not that she was jealous, because Clarke was genuinely happy for Octavia after the many flirts that had never lasted very long in the past, but as she saw her with Lincoln and how loving they could be together, she couldn't help but wish that she had that, too ── that there was someone in the world who worshipped her that way and loved her, wanted her and needed her in a way that she had never felt. Maybe that was fueled by her creative nature, by the frustration she felt every time she tried to put that sort of love on paper, only to conclude that she didn't feel it enough to do so. Maybe it was just a human need that she, too, experienced.

When she blinked her blue eyes open and stared at the bright, sunny sky, Clarke Griffin was met with dark spots in her line of vision for several seconds, and although she often wished she could just look up straight into the sun without having to divert her gaze, she couldn't. As she cast her eyes down towards the earth again, the dark spots became swirly patterns that grew, grew, grew, as she adjusted her sight to look at her surroundings, and through the weary haze, her eyes fell upon a teenager with extremely baggy pants pushing himself forwards across the path between the grass on his skateboard, upon general passers-by, mostly students walking with their friends or lovers, their books tucked under their arms or in heavy bags as they walked to or from their classes. Some of them had followed her thought and sat huddled together on benches, with ice cream or frozen yoghurt or other delicacies while animatedly talking with companions or texting or reading. Everyone was in motion somehow, though ── everyone but one person, she noted as the dark spots before her eyes began to disappear, and in her line of sight fell unruly curls tied together tightly over a milky white shoulder that she just knew she had seen before. As she blinked, quite furiously, to will the last of the dark away, she focused and confirmed that the one person not in motion, seated upon a rather large rock, with her back against a tall willow tree by the small stream, her legs tucked against her, arms draped loosely but somehow uncomfortably about them, was the girl from months before that she had seen being photographed by her partner.

Eyes never diverting, Clarke blindly reached for her shoulder bag and searched for her sketchbook, digging it up and pulling it into her lap, opening it, leafing through a few pages before she ripped her gaze away and let it fall upon the drawings she had made only shortly before the last one she had started. She passed by sketches of bees upon bushes and intricate clocks in bell towers, jewelry in shopping windows... and at last upon two young women in love, one attempting to capture the beauty of the other one on camera. Clarke Griffin blinked up at the girl a few feet further, then back down at the rough sketch she had started all these months ago, and Clarke let the tip of her forefinger slowly trail over the partly-sketched sunflower in unruly curls that had made Clarke recognize her. There was no sunflower to be noticed in her amazing hair this time, and she seemed to be alone. Somehow, somewhere, Clarke felt the strange need to walk up to her and talk to her, though she didn't know what she would say.

Redirecting her gaze once more, at the brunette, Clarke noted she wore more casual, less-feminine clothes now, than she had last time Clarke had seen her. This time, she wore tight skinny jeans with a loose, light blue blouse. It fit her very well, but Clarke thought she had looked cuter, more approachable, in her more girly clothes. She couldn't read the girl's expression from her spot, but Clarke thought she looked very lonely. The blonde's decision to let the sketchbook fall closed and stuff it in her bag again as she got to her feet and screwed up the plastic container that had held Clarke's strawberry-flavored frozen yoghurt with one hand to throw away on her way and walk over to the girl, was fueled by her kind-hearted nature mostly.

The girl didn't look up as Clarke gently set her bag down and then plopped down on her butt herself beside her. It was only after a full minute had ticked by that the brunette blinked and turned her gaze aside to look at Clarke. There was no look of recognition in her eyes; Clarke knew that she mustn't have remembered her the way she had her. A warm smile touched the blonde's lips. "When I last saw you in the park, you had a big and yellow flower in your hair," Clarke said in a kind tone as she tried to break the ice and create small talk.

Her sincere smile faltered just a bit as the girl before only continued to stare at her for several seconds before she answered in a monotone voice, which didn't seem to fit her at all, "Then the last time you saw me was the day my lover died."

Clarke's mouth opened as shock filled her at the words rasped from between pink lips, full of emotion and devoid of all of it all at once. She wanted to say sorry for the obvious loss of the person beside her. She wanted to beat herself up for having sat down there so casually, having tried to make small talk with a stranger so tactlessly, despite the fact that, deep down, she knew she couldn't have had a clue about it. Thoughts whirred through her mind, as the information that had been provided to her filtered into her brain. What had happened to the other girl? It was hard for the blonde to come to terms with the idea that the girl she had seen months prior, that had been so full of life and seemingly so happy, was no more. She couldn't even begin to imagine what it must be like for the girl beside her, her lover. Did she remember the day when she had worn the flower in her unruly curls so well because it was imbedded in her brain as some sort of flashbulb memory? Had she still worn it when her lover died, when she had heard the unfortunate news; had she maybe been there when it happened herself? That sort of questions you didn't ask a stranger you had never spoken to before.

Before Clarke managed to transfer words from her brain stem to her mouth and say them, though, the brunette had gotten to her feet, ready to leave, as if she felt violated in her own space, and Clarke, who noticed, couldn't help but feel very guilty, for her lack of tact. The blonde rose as well and held her hands up, to stop the brunette. "I'm sorry for the way I approached you," she started, and as she came to eye level with the other girl, both on their feet, she saw the warm rays of sunshine dance across tear tracks on pale cheeks, leaving what looked like glistening lines of despair, "Please don't feel like you have to go. I shouldn't have just walked up to you and decided for you you might need company, so I will just go now so you can stay if you like and act as if this never happened."

Momentarily then, the brunette regarded Clarke with deep green eyes as she considered the blonde's well-meant words, weighing them, contemplating them. When Clarke bent down to grab her bag and do as she had said, back away and leave her be, it was the brunette's turn to hold her hands up and stop Clarke from moving forward. "I'm sorry for being rude, if I am. I just haven't been myself since C-"

Abruptly, the brunette stopped as she somehow stumbled over half a syllable, green eyes falling shut and remaining that way for a second too long to be unintentional, a sigh eschewing from her lips, before she whispered, "Costia," presumably the name of her lost lover, before she looked up again with still-tearful eyes. She cleared her throat if only to sound less vulnerable, less fragile, less broken whenever she spoke next. Her stance looked defensive, her expression guarded, as if she didn't feel up to talking to Clarke any more than she had already, but at the same time she seemed to be full to the brim with words she wanted to say but hadn't managed to.

Clarke somehow understood the look in her gaze too well. When her father died, all she had wanted to hear, to see, was her dad, needing to keep him as close to her as she could, as ubiquitous... as _alive_ , despite the fact that any mention of him seemed to shatter her soul a little more. All at once, Clarke Griffin had wanted to speak of him every second, yet been unable to. When she could speak of her beloved father without feeling like she was dying, the need to do so hadn't been as overwhelming anymore. For one moment, she recognized some of herself all those years ago in the haunting look of the girl before her, eyes sunk and weary, bearing a heavily battered soul and shielding everything from everyone altogether. Briefly, she wondered if the girl had any people in her life that she could talk with, and if so, if she had.

The blonde regarded the girl before her for a long moment, any and all traces of her haste gone. She didn't seem like she wanted to leave as soon as possible anymore. Clarke suspected the brunette, whose came she didn't even know, probably didn't really know what to do with herself right now, like she hadn't after Jake's death. "I won't presume to know exactly how you feel..." she started, gasping for air as she was at a loss for the girl's name, "but I lost someone special to me, too," Clarke spoke. She knew from experience that those words didn't help much, but it felt imperative she try anyway.

Green eyes captured blue ones; Clarke's stumble of words didn't pass unnoticed. "My name is Lexa," she spoke, voice monotone as it had been. While she didn't usually share her name with people she randomly met in the park ── while she didn't usually speak to people whom she met randomly in the park, especially after sweeping in with as little tact as the blonde had ── the slim brunette girl felt like her name rolled off of her tongue quite naturally as she looked at the woman who quickly introduced herself as,

"Clarke," Clarke said with a warm, gentle smile, pinching the hand that she had awkwardly nearly proffered in introduction in a tight fist at her side. The blonde didn't know if her attempts to hide her near-gesture had been successful, or if the other girl just pretended not to notice. There was something in her green eyes that she couldn't describe which somehow spoke of a very perceptive personal nature.

A nod. "Clarke," she repeated, as if to test the sound of the blonde's name on her lips ── she stressed the 'k' more than Clarke was used to from other people, and for a second, the blonde wondered if that made her name sound strange, until she realized she didn't really care either way, for she liked the way her given name sounded coming from the other girl's mouth.

They stood gazing at each other a moment longer before the brunette lowered herself to the grass again. Clarke ── uncertain if this was actually an invitation for her to follow suit or not ── waited a few seconds before sitting down beside Lexa, keeping some space between them. She assumed that if the girl hadn't really wanted her company, she either would have left or would have said something, especially after Clarke's earlier offer to go. She didn't seem like the type of girl too shy to speak up about her wishes.

Silence ruled between the two girls as they sat comfortably in each other's presence for several moments before Lexa spoke in a near-inaudible voice, "My last happy memory with Costia was here, in this park, presumably the day you saw us," she began, focusing on a point in the far distance that Clarke couldn't pinpoint, at everything but at the stranger to which she felt the strangest deep connection, with whom she felt the strangest need to speak of what she had lost despite not even having met her until that very day. Maybe it was the fact that she was a stranger that offered her the feeling of being free in what she said without any fear at all of judgment or without fear of repercussions for it if there actually were any after all. She felt comfortable in her knowledge that she could pack up and go if she wanted to, without having any sort of obligation or expectation to look back. "She had just gotten her new camera from her parents and had been excited to try it in-between classes. I had a day off due to a professor falling ill and met her before she had to go to her last class of the day. I loved being in Costia's presence until the last day. She was so easy to talk to and to forget life and all its demands with. That is part of the reason why I fell for her to begin with."

When Clarke noted the near-imperceptible glare of tears in her green eyes and the brunette fell silent, she offered, "You two did seem happy together."

The last that Clarke expected was for the other girl to rip her steady gaze away from the spot that she had somehow thought more feasible to look at for the past few minutes than the blonde and look up. A smile was on Lexa's face, but it wasn't genuine. It was full of bitterness and self-loathing, if Clarke read the stranger beside her well. "We were for a long time," Lexa allowed. "I don't know what changed or when exactly, though, but the weeks before her death, I had come to the conclusion that I didn't feel as in love with her as I had. I had tried to talk to her about it but not found the right time. That day, I texted her as soon as she had gone from my sight to tell her she should come by my dorm when class was over, because I really needed to talk to her about something. I didn't even tell her I loved her, just that. She never responded."

At this, the brunette suppressed a hollow sob bubbling from the depths of her by biting down on her lip hard. A tear slipped unbidden past pink lips, down her cheek, much like something you drop from the top step of a staircase, first tumbling down slowly, slowly, and then so fast that you can't stop it, until it crashes in a million pieces. Clarke's natural reaction was to reach over with a hand to lay it on top of Lexa's, as if to tell her she wasn't alone, to offer a silent sort of support. When she caught herself, Clarke doubted for a few seconds before moving to pull her hand back before deciding differently, figuring that, Lexa being a stranger that she had just met or not, she needed the wordless support as she spilled the aching feelings she had probably held inside for far too long already. It seemed to help; after several moments of recuperating from the overwhelming emotions, Lexa Woods seemed to regain her speech.

"I will never know if her feelings had changed as well or not. I do believe that she knew mine had, though, and that that's what I wanted to talk to her about that night," Lexa resumed, exhaling slowly. "Costia was never reckless as a driver: she never sped, and she was also highly aware of other people while on the road. The day she got killed, though, she apparently ran a red light and crashed into somebody else. She didn't die on the spot but made it to the hospital alive with relatively severe but survivable injuries. It was a miracle that it wasn't worse, with how fast she was going and the fact that she hit a large van, but it was bad enough that she didn't make it through the night that followed."

Nodding, Clarke quietly confirmed that she was listening, to whatever the stranger beside her wanted to share. It was all Lexa needed before looking away once again.

"Maybe if I had given it time..." Lexa began, but she couldn't finish the thought that had run through her head so often before already. Time alone wouldn't have rekindled her feelings, she knew deep inside. She would never know for sure now, though, nor would she ever know if maybe if she had chosen another moment, Costia would have lived. She could never have wanted for this to happen, despite what Costia's parents thought, felt and said. They had both simply _adored_ their daughter, but they had never really agreed to her partner choice, believing that Lexa was not their sort of people, that she lived life too much from day to day and too much on edge. Costia had stated that that was why she had felt attracted to Lexa in the first place.

Clarke didn't need for Lexa to finish to know the struggle she must be going through. She had been in that exact same spot years ago, too, dwelling on 'what if' scenarios, beating herself up for things she hadn't been and never would be able to control. "There's no use to asking yourself what could have happened. It didn't actually happen, no matter how sad it is."

A slight nod and a deep sigh from Lexa followed. "I know. I just wish that all of the happy memories I have made with her weren't tainted."

"I know it helps to try and hold on to those."

Another nod. "It does, if only for now."

Quiescence fell over them once more as they both crawled into their own thoughts and minds, not looking at each other. After a long time really, Lexa turned to Clarke abruptly with a wild expression in her eyes. "What?" Clarke asked, having turned her blonde head when she heard the other girl move.

"I'm so sorry for having dumped all of this on you," Lexa spoke. "I mean, I don't even know you. Either way, I am sure that you have better, more useful, things to do."

Without another word, Lexa Woods jumped to her feet and took hold of her shoulder bag as she made to leave, without even looking back. Surprised by this sudden action, unsure if maybe it was fueled by more guilt-tripping thoughts of her own or something else entirely, Clarke followed and hastily grabbed for her own bag, feeling the hard cover of the art book that she had pushed in there slap hard against her side. It was only when Lexa made to run from the spot where they had just sat together for the past hour that she registered what had caused her side to feel tender, and that gave Clarke an idea. "Lexa, please wait!" she called, pulling back the flap of her shoulder bag with deft fingers, digging up her art book and leafing through the pages quickly, to search for one piece, in particular.

Lexa did as she was requested and halted, turning to Clarke again. Clear confusion splayed across her forehead as she watched the blonde rip a page from a thick-cover book, then turned it over and fished for a small gnawed-at pencil in the depths of her bag to jot something down in the right hand corner. "Clarke...?" Lexa asked.

The brunette's questions were answered when the blonde turned the paper over again and then thrust it towards her with a rather eager expression on her face. "I know it isn't finished," she said, "but maybe you'll find comfort in it nonetheless as you hold on or let go. Which of those it is, is up to you only."

* * *

Author's Note: Please review. I'm on Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr as well, by the way ── feel free to hop on and have a look and follow me; I'm BrokePerception on all three!


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

No day passed that Clarke didn't, however briefly, find her thoughts stray off to Lexa Woods, the girl she had met in the park, the girl she had spoken to once, whose tale Clarke had listened to with such sadness but hadn't heard of since. Whereas maybe in one way the situation she was in was similar to how she had felt after seeing Lexa with her lover, whose name Clarke had discovered had been Costia, she felt different now. There was nothing incredibly pressing about everything now, nothing persistent. There was a peace that she felt inside her, since having given the brunette with the big but empty chocolate-colored eyes her sketch. When she thought about her now, Clarke just really wondered how she was and hoped that she was fine, or as fine as currently possible. These thoughts were accompanied with a strange sort of worry when she did, worry about how she was and felt and hope that she was recuperating and maybe, slowly, carefully, beginning to let go of the guilt she had so obviously threatened to go down under when they had spoken, that first and last time, six days ago.

Maybe when she had jotted her phone number down on the back of the thick sketch paper, she hadn't expected to get a text or call, hadn't expected for Lexa to make use of it. She didn't know why she had done it, exactly. She had been compelled to do so, to somehow offer Lexa a shoulder to cry on if she wanted, as if to let her know she wasn't alone, however alone and abandoned she might feel.

When she heard her phone buzz in the kitchen ── Clarke Griffin had the tendency to forget to turn the sound of her phone on once again after classes, after having put it on 'vibrate' so as not to disturb the professors ── Clarke Griffin paid little to no heed to it. She faintly registered it, but figured that it couldn't be anything important. She had answered a random text from her mom only about twenty minutes before, nothing had seemed abnormal in any way, and her close friends were gathered on pillows on the floor with her as they played a game of cards, Octavia seated in Lincoln's lap as they played more together than on their own, allowing them the strength of combined minds for both of their turns and leading to either one of them having won every game already, despite Jasper and Monty often being second and third, interchangeably, with Raven and she tying for last place.

Raven, who mustn't have heard the buzzing ── if so, she would have certainly taken her chance to give Clarke hell again for having forgotten to turn on the sound and possibly missing a call or text from Bellamy, as he was responsible for their food and supposed to be on the way with it that night ── as she put her half-empty can of beer down beside her before exclaiming, "Come on, Griffin, your turn, before they manage to find a way to beat me again!"

Clarke, attention totally astray from her phone and whoever might have attempted to reach her, raised a brow at Raven while suppressing a chuckle as Jasper's voice sounded, "You wish." Nonetheless, the blonde's blue eyes darted across her cards as she ran her fingertip over the smooth cardboard edges and she selected a jack of hearts, throwing it on the pile of cards in the middle to be discarded. She watched the dark-haired engineer smile slyly, expectantly, hopeful as Clarke considered all of her four options, aware that if she did somehow pick the one Raven wanted, Raven was going to win this game and manage to discard her last card. She didn't give anything away as she watched the blonde intently, her long fingers slowly stroking the back of the lone card in her left hand.

"Spades."

"Ha!" Raven exclaimed, slamming her three of spades down on the floor, the smile on her tanned face full of confidence when she won the game, earning moans of frustration from the rest of the company as they threw their cards down in defeat, complaints raising as they told each other how close they had been to winning as well.

As if on cue, the door bell to Clarke's dorm room resounded through the mash-up of voices, and Clarke, pushing the stack of cards towards the winner to tell her wordlessly she had to distribute next, held her hands up to the others who complained about her bad choice. She got up in a fluid easy motion, pushing herself off of the floor by digging her heels down into the carpet and making for the door to open it for Octavia's brother, the most senior of their friends group and also last to arrive, and for that alone, having been punished with responsibility for their dinner. Complaints transformed into cheers of gratitude when the smell of greasy pizza filled the youths' nostrils, making their mouths water already. Clarke followed in Bellamy's wake as he immediately set off towards the kitchen, to help, a variety of pizza boxes in his arms. He somehow knew which kinds would be liked most by his friends, though. All of the slices would be eaten by the end of their get-together, leaving empty boxes scattered over the living room, that Clarke or one of her dorm mates would pick up in the morning, as they were often too intoxicated and high on the buzz of it to do so before falling asleep.

As Bellamy deposited the pizza boxes on the half-full table, Clarke reached for the top one and already began to peel back the lid to open it up as Bellamy followed her example. Gratefully offering him a small smile as he took the open boxes to their friends in the living room, Clarke reached for the next pizza box when her eye fell on her cell phone lying right beside the bread box, and she remembered the buzzing she had heard earlier that indicated a text. She let the pizza box be for now and opted to see who had tried to reach her. Her friends wouldn't die from the two minute wait, especially since they already had two extra large pizzas to stuff themselves with.

Moving her thumb across the screen in a rather specific pattern, the blonde unlocked her phone and clicked on the envelop icon, with the small '1' beside it. Immediately, she noticed that it was a number that wasn't saved yet in her contact list, and one Clarke didn't recognize. The crease on her forehead disappeared as she moved on to read the message itself… and knew whom it was from.

 **I'm sorry for babbling so much during the last conversation the two of us had. I don't usually tell my life story to people whom I've never met. Your sketch is very beautiful, and I would say that you have a talent. It is nice that it isn't finished. Costia and I weren't finished when she died either.**

A full smile came upon Clarke's face as she read the words from Lexa, and she immediately began to type her response, almost unthinkingly.

 **I am glad that you liked it. You didn't talk too much at all. I am glad that you could let go of some of that heartache.**

The first three sentences were put down rather quickly, and she was just debating whether she should add something else or not, when she heard her name being called from the room over, by one of several intoxicated friends, who were mostly interested in the rest of the pizza, which she was supposed to take to them. She shook her blonde head at how hopeless, in a way, they were, adding a 'here if you need me, to talk or whatever. x' before sending the text to its recipient, locking her screen and throwing her phone back on the bread box. Reaching for the pizza box she had already meant to open earlier, Clarke figured she would read any texts Lexa might send back after she had fed those hungry hippos.

* * *

4 DAYS LATER

Clarke Griffin read her text for the fourth time, thumb hovering indecisively, over the button to send it off to the contact she had added all but four days prior, as she sat on the couch, watching yet not watching at all an old rerun of E.R. They had somehow spoken every day since that one text Lexa had sent her, to apologize for what she had called rambling. She had doubted a bit like this the day after that, before sending her message to wish her a good morning ── although by the time the blonde had gotten from bed, it had been closer to noon ── and to confirm once more that she really hadn't talked too much, and if she ever wanted to talk about anything again, she had her number. Lexa's response had come nearly immediately, thanking her, telling her she would remember. Clarke had extracted two things from that exchange particularly. One: Lexa Woods was one of those people who texted back nearly immediately. Two: despite her telling Clarke she would remember the offer made, it was unlikely that Lexa would spill any of her fears and heartaches to her again, in light of the way it had happened last time in the park.

It had been Lexa to wish Clarke a good morning, despite the prediction of rainy weather, the day after that, Clarke to wish the brunette a good morning once more the one after that, despite her having had a late class the night before, as the other girl had mentioned in one of the follow-up messages to their morning wishes. Clarke had started to feel like, somehow, it had become a routine of sorts after four consecutive days of them switching between wishing the other a wonderful morning and sharing the way their days would look, quite superficially. When Clarke hadn't received a text that morning from the other young woman, Clarke had texted first close to noon, not thinking too much of it then, but since it had become late afternoon already, she couldn't help but feel worried in a way that told her she probably had a right to be.

They hadn't known one another all that long, and that 'known' was a bit limited anyway, so the blonde wasn't quite sure if it was in her place to assume now. Nonetheless, she felt that she should at least attempt to approach Lexa in any way possible and just risk getting burned if it came down to it.

 **Hello! I just wanted to know if you're okay, since I haven't heard from you all day. Don't feel pressured, but I just thought I remind you my offer still stands if you feel like you need to talk to someone** **about absolutely anything.**

As Clarke sent the text message, she wasn't sure if she expected there to be a reply or not. She thought it could go down two ways, with Lexa either not wanting to speak to her at all anymore, temporarily or not, or the gentle approach doing just the opposite and convincing Lexa that she could come to Clarke, even if only to tell her she didn't want to talk.

Lexa's response came in when she didn't expect one anymore, several hours later, and hers to that one was typed and sent in a matter of a minute, without doubting.

 **Hi... Yeah, I'm sorry for going MIA on you. I had a bit of a bad day, but I'll be okay. I wouldn't know where to begin to put it all in words, but thanks.**

Looking up at the big clock that hung above the couch in the tiny living room, Clarke determined it wasn't too late yet to make the suggestion that sprang to mind at once and began to type. From the several minutes that passed in-between sending her text and receiving one from Lexa, Clarke could tell Lexa had doubted at least a bit before finally replying. She had been nearly certain that the answer would be negative, but it wasn't when it came in, so that was a beginning already.

 **If you're not busy, we can meet up somewhere and have a beer together. We can meet up in thirty at the mall and go on from there?**

 **Okay. I'll be there.**

* * *

4 WEEKS LATER

"Fuck!" Lexa mouthed as she stumbled over a patch of uneven dirt under her right foot, turning back intuitively into the dark to look for the cause, the hazy glow of the half moon and the blanket of stars not nearly offering enough light for her to determine specific shapes among the rocks in the grass that made a small path through the park. Clarke and she had left the main road a minute ago. She could see the street lights from where they were, and she could also see the ones from the street on the other side of the small park, but they were unluckily in a dark zone in-between ── not that it would have helped her or anyone to know which rock or other item had been the culprit for her stumble and fall.

Hearing the way her companion's breath caught and the specific, typical sound of someone catching their feet on something, Clarke's laughter halted as she turned her face to the side. "Lexa, are you…?" she began, but before she reached the end of the half-finished question, she saw the brunette topple over, losing her balance when she turned her head for whatever reason.

Despite never deliberately reaching the sort of intoxication that would leave Lexa with holes in her memory later, she could feel the whiskeys and beers between her ears as she turned back, felt them in the way her pulse rushed through her temples at the quick, instinctive movement, and nearly inevitably landed on her knees on the change-over between rock and grass. Not too wasted to forget to try and break her fall yet, she extended her hands just in time not to end up faceplanting, fingers digging into the dirt.

Slightly more wasted than her companion, though not by much, Clarke reached over slightly awkwardly and laid a hand upon the brunette's shoulder, attempting to lean over to sit down beside her but acutely miscalculating the distance between her half-bent knees and the earth and coming down a bit too hard and doing what Lexa had managed not to until then. By the pressure of her own hand on the brunette's shoulder, though, and Lexa being as unsteady as she was, she caused both of them to topple over entirely. Lexa's luck, however, was the fact that she had already outstretched her hands and didn't come down hard. Clarke, on the other hand, awkwardly grazed the pretty green grass with her teeth.

Quite dumbfounded at her own clumsiness and what had happened for a few seconds, Clarke luckily quickly regained her consciousness and pulled her arm back, at the same time rolling over onto her back as Lexa made to do the exact same, to come to a sitting position and then push themselves, possibly one another, up from there, so that they could both continue on their way home.

Clarke and Lexa always walked through the park together when they had been in the city together for drinks or food. At the other end, their ways would separate and Lexa would turn left, Clarke right. Although the rest of their walks were nearly the same distance, Lexa would have a few turns ahead, while Clarke had to walk straight ahead. They had never actively wasted a lot of time so far at each other's places, but they had seen where the other lived in the past few weeks as they had generally wasted more time together, taking time to see each other at least a few times a week for lunch or dinner and drinks one or two times if at all possible. While Lexa didn't really have a social life of her own, the brunette had sort of melted into Clarke's for a great deal, getting along very well with her friends. In fact, when they went to have drinks, Lexa fit in just as much as Raven and Octavia did despite not being able to rely on as much of a shared 'history'. The only reason why the two had left before Octavia, Raven, Jasper and Monty, was because of how early they both had to be in class, Raven's morning class sadly having had to be cancelled the next day, with her professor having to go in for an unexpected gall bladder surgery, and Octavia's first class not even happening until eleven.

Forehead creased at the very unappealing taste of grass that filled her mouth, Clarke Griffin spat several straws of grass from her mouth. As she made to move to a sitting position, however, Lexa's voice stopped her, unexpectedly. "Do you stargaze?"

Gently turning her head to the side and letting her blue eyes fall upon Lexa and how peaceful she seemed to lay there, in the grass ── insofar as Clarke could tell in the dark ── the blonde felt herself relax back a bit and genuinely thought about the question. "My dad took me stargazing when I was little," she responded. "Honestly, I can't remember having ever done so without him. It must have been a very long time. Do you?" She added the last bit in just a soft whisper.

For a long moment, the brunette didn't answer. Then, "I do catch myself sometimes gazing at the stars, yeah. Then I wonder where those ridiculous ideas come from that everyone who is dead has a star up in the sky and that kind of things."

A bit taken aback at Lexa's intoxicated bluntness, Clarke remained silent before whispering, "I believe it is a rather symbolic way of looking at things. They're always there, but you can only see them at night. Then when we can see them, they seem so very close, but we still can't reach them. They seem small to the world, but they are incredible in size. Very few people realize. They seem to always just be there, too. I believe that's how our loved ones are for us when they are gone. They're always with us, even if we might not be thinking about them actively the entire time. We carry them with us in what we say and what we do, in the people we are, those we become. We remember them from when they were beside us, but they're in a place where we can't reach them. Sometimes, I don't know if it makes it better or worse, because it is like they are just taunting us. To the rest of the world, they might have just been a part of a giant whole, but to us, they were a big part of our world and continue to be even after their deaths," she spoke. "Requited love doesn't just stop existing, regardless of what kind of love it is. It allows you to remember for instance Costia as a star in Heaven."

A small shake of the head followed. However touched by Clarke's words she felt, she couldn't agree entirely. "I don't believe in a Heaven."

A small smile touched Clarke's lips as the brunette and the blonde eyed each other. "Neither do I, but I have respect for those who do. Either way, it is okay for you to remember her, as well as it is okay for you to sometimes let her sit in the back corner of your mind and enjoy life. I see how you chastise yourself internally for each smile or laugh. I didn't get the chance to know her, but I am sure that she would have wanted for you to be happy, regardless of how the situation was between you when she died. I know that you loved each other."

That last bit was added as an afterthought as Clarke saw the look of uncertainty in Lexa's eyes, the protests upon thin lips. The blonde knew that the brunette saw things differently, but she really didn't believe that Lexa deserved to feel guilty for the rest of her life because she still had one and Costia didn't.

Lexa's only response to those words, as well as the small afterthought that meant so much to her, was to gently slide her hand over and entwine her fingers with Clarke's, squeezing them, conveying all of the things that she wished she could say but couldn't put in words, as well as the things she had slowly begun to feel when she was with Clarke but didn't even dare admit to herself quite yet.

* * *

4 MONTHS LATER

A wide smile broke through across Clarke's face as she heard the ringtone that indicated that she had received a text, just as she slid her key into the lock of her door. She knew who it would be from despite the fact that they had only just said goodbye for the night. Letting the door fall shut, Clarke proceeded to set her handbag down onto the counter and moved to take off her thick dark blue shawl and leather jacket, hanging both items on the peg before taking her handbag, fishing her cell phone from its depths before adding it on the peg, everything ready to go for when she left her dorm next.

In the dark, blindly finding her way, she crossed the living room and turned right before the kitchen, unlocking the screen of her phone and opening the text as she took one step at a time, her memory and the bright light from her phone keeping her from falling. She had only had two glasses of wine with dinner as well, and that had been two hours ago. Lexa and she had ended up talking long after dessert in the warm, comfortable buzz of people coming and going and talking while drinking and eating in the bistro off the main road. It had become their favorite spot to eat after their first visit a few months before, and they couldn't help ending up there at least once every two weeks, with its large portions of great food at a decent price even for students. The menu was variable enough as well, which was rare for most restaurants in their neighborhood and in that specific price range.

 **I'm home.**

 **I'm home, too.**

It had become their custom to let each other know that they were home safe when they had been to dinner or elsewhere together. While Lexa still got along very well with Clarke's friends and considered them her own as well, the two had taken to going off just on their own as well of late, on occasion. It had started to feel like their evening hadn't been completed without that small exchange of texts. The past few weeks in general, if not months, they hadn't really felt complete at all if they hadn't heard from each other at least a few times a day. If noon rolled by without a text from each other, they began to miss each other in a strange way.

Whatever it was between them, Clarke couldn't rightly say, but Lexa had become an integral part of her life that she felt she couldn't miss anymore and that she would be lost without. Locating her PJs neatly folded at the end of her single bed, Clarke made to put her phone down on her nightstand so that she could switch her attires and get ready for bed just when a new text came in.

 **Thanks for the really great evening at Quasi's. I'm going to watch a movie and then have a great night's sleep after having all that yummy food and the lovely company.**

Sitting down at the edge of her bed with her phone in hand, her PJs long forgotten, Clarke's fingers began to type a response all of their own, seemingly. Talking to Lexa was so easy for her. The words flowed from her mouth and fingers so effortlessly. If she compared the first few texts that she had received from Lexa to the way they typed to each other so often lately, Clarke could even tell in the way she typed that Lexa was in a different place than she had been when they first met, shortly after Costia's passing. She seemed happier now, more peaceful. At first, she had had a pretty hard time moving on from that place and also accepting that, in light of her loss, and the guilt that had plagued her so greatly seemed to just be on the back burner now. Clarke wasn't as stupid as to believe that all of those fears and worries were entirely gone now, especially with how sensitive the brunette was, deep inside, despite coming off so strongly and fearlessly to people who didn't know her. The brunette was no longer in a place where she felt like she should be guilty for smiling or laughing or for just living.

Clarke felt very much the same way as Lexa did, too. Unlike her, though, she was beat and wouldn't be able to stay awake during even half of a movie after not having had the best night the night prior ── what with her right side neighbors having had a party until four-thirty ── and having had an exceptionally early class at seven-thirty.

 **I had a really lovely night with you as well. NOTHING tops lasagna from Quasi's to me! I'm off to bed. I'm beat. I hope you enjoy your movie, whichever one it is you will watch.**

Pressing 'send', the blonde finally did put her phone down on the nightstand with a bit of delay and began to peel her top off of her. Crossing her arms across her upper body, she grabbed the hem and began to pull it over her head, dropping it on the bed carelessly to fold later and reaching back to undo her bra. She always felt so relieved when she could relieve herself from the confines of her bustier. Dumping her bra on top of her top, she plucked the top of her pajamas up and pulled it over her head. As soon as she had managed to pull it over her bare breasts and pulled it down, she was notified of another text message. _Quick._

 **I don't know which one it will be. I will find something on Netflix, I'm sure. It is too early to go to bed. You're no fun!**

 **I love you, too.**

Clarke's answer was typed very quickly, unthinkingly. It was said jokingly… in a way. As soon as she had typed it and sent it and reread the words once more, Clarke fell back on the bed, rereading them over and over again as she considered whether or not they were said jokingly. It had never truly come up in her mind to type a smiley face as she would have with other friends just to make her _no homo_ intention clear.

She didn't know when it had happened over the past few months exactly, but if she hadn't fallen in love with Lexa already, then she definitely could. It was as that realization sprang into her mind that her eyes trailed back to the screen, that had by then gone dark. No text back. Her worry began to grow as she felt maybe she had jeopardized their friendship. Maybe she should tell Lexa it had been meant as a joke. She didn't get any further than 'Listen, Lexa' when a text from the brunette filled her screen. A text she knew wasn't meant jokingly and completely opened Clarke Griffin's heart and world.

 **I love YOU, too.**


End file.
